


Downtown Train

by littleblackbow



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-03
Updated: 2014-10-03
Packaged: 2018-02-19 17:30:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2396795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleblackbow/pseuds/littleblackbow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just something I wrote that came into my head after listening to "Downtown Train" by Tom Waits.</p><p>It makes more sense after listening to that song over and over.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Downtown Train

Micro-journal of Draco Malfoy

Part One

 

It’s surprisingly difficult to find someone who doesn’t even know he’s lost. This is twice or maybe three times as true for someone who’s an idiot to begin with. For starters, he’s always right there, out in public, which is the absolute _worst_ place to try to find someone. For future reference, if there’s anyone out there who wants to be lost to the world, just go out to a major city, and act like a normal person.

So, when one _does_ find someone, it has to be considered something of a miracle, hasn’t it? The sheer improbability that _I_ of all people would find _him_ of all people baffles my mind. And I’ve got quite a difficult mind to baffle when it really comes down to it. This whole situation is even more unbelievable because I found him on the underground. That’s right, me. On the underground. Don’t ask why or how. Let’s just say that there was a mix of whiskey and a bad direction spell involved.

But when I finally stopped my hysterical panicking, and sat down on those hard bench-like things the Muggles were sitting on, I saw him just sitting there across from me, bobbing his head up and down with white wires coming out of his ears and smiling like the idiot he was.

At first, I thought it was just part of the hallucinogenic effect of the urine-scented corridor I’d had to walk through on my way to the underground worm-machine. But when a bunch of school girls in short skirts went right up to him, giggled, and asked him, of all people, where the Canon Street station was, he pulled out those wires, smiled, told them it was two more stops along, and then waved them away politely.

I didn’t know what to do, so I just sat there and waited. The girls left after the mechanical worm stopped two more times, and then after another four stops, he got up and left. 

And I followed. I tried to look as nonchalant as possible while following him at a close distance. This wasn’t really difficult to do considering how many Muggles were wandering around at that time of night. We walked through a park, then down to a store where he bought a green bottle of something and I pretended to tie my shoe and adjust my muffler. 

I followed him down the block, across the four-way intersection, and then down another row of houses until we came to a large brown building. As I finally passed him by at his destination, he turned to me and waved. “Haven’t seen you on the tube before. Do you live around here, too?”

“Uh, I think so. Right down the next row.” God, that was lame, but it was all I could think of. Everything that everyone had told me was true. Apparently he had forgotten all about me. Well, he’d forgotten everything, but to be perfectly honest, most of what was left in his past was rather forgettable, anyway. 

“Right, well, I’ll see you then, I guess.” He nodded, then went into the building. 

And I just stood there. It was a good five minutes before I turned and went around the corner to apparate away. 

 

\---000---

Part two

I keep hearing Muggles talking about stalkers, and I’d just like to put it out there that what I’m doing can _not_ be considered stalking. He never once asked me to stop following him, and from what I could tell, he seemed to enjoy having someone walk home with him occasionally. Even if I wasn’t exactly going home. In fact, the subject never really came up, now that I think of it. He just assumed that I lived somewhere near him and was going home the same way.

No, that’s not exactly true, is it? I guess I did tell him I lived just a few rows over. But still, that came from his general assumption that I must live nearby because I walked all the way...

... Fine, so I was stalking him. But really, what would you do? Here’s this person you haven’t seen in years. He’s supposed to be completely wiped of his previous life, but fate brings him to you again. Not only that, but those damn eyes would just look right into my soul and all of my memories would come back while his memories were just forming. It was absolutely maddening!

Today, we stopped together in the park where this bloke was selling fish and chips from at truck of all things. For a moment I panicked, not knowing how to tell him that I didn’t have any Muggle money. But he bought me one and paid for it before I could say a thing. “You can get it next time,” he told me, handing over the paper bundle of... could you call that food? I ate one chip and pinched off one piece of fish.

“My name’s Harry,” he told me. I nearly choked on my food.

“I’m, um, Dra--ke.”

“Drake? Hmm. Unusual name.” He smiled and held out a hand. “Nice meeting you, Drake.”

I have to admit it took me a few moments to realize what was happening. For a moment there, I could only see the two of us just entering our first year at Hogwarts. I was a stuck-up self-centered prat, and he was one of the first people who saw me for exactly who I was _and called me out on it._ And then there he was, holding out his hand to me again, offering to be my friend.

I took it. Yeah, I’m not ashamed to admit it. He held out his hand and I took it. And it wasn’t anything like what I’d expected. He looked at me funny for a moment, then chuckled and went back to eating his fish and chips. To him, it was as if nothing happened at all, but to me, this was one of the saddest things I’d ever experienced. I’d like to say that it was generally because I had been forgotten by someone, but what really stung was that _he_ had forgotten me. There wasn’t even a glimmer of a memory in that handshake.

The unspeakables had done their job well.

\---000---

Part Three

 

Don’t laugh. You have to promise not to laugh. 

Promise?

Right, so I rented a flat in that neighborhood. Two rows down and about six houses in. It’s a grimy, dingy horrible little place that smells of old beer and smoke and is so completely bereft of style that even a full magical overhaul wouldn’t help it. It isn’t as if I’m going to _live_ there. I just need a place in case the gets the daft idea to walk me home first instead of the other way around. Not that that’s going to happen, but still, _if_ it does, it isn’t as if I can just side-along apparate him to my home in the wizarding side of Devon.

As I was sitting across from him in the worm-tube today, the girls started getting closer to him, and he seemed to be getting annoyed. That’s my boy! One of them handed him a candy and giggled. He simply put it in his pocket and nodded. Then told them they ought to get closer to the doors since there stop was only three stations away.

I wonder if my subtlety had rubbed off on him at some point, and that was, perhaps the one thing that stuck with him when he received his new personality and new life. I have heard that my personality is strong like that. Strong enough to persist even through the results of the strongest unspeakable’s spells. Or maybe he had just finally learned some common sense since becoming someone else.

Either way, I chuckled at the gesture, and he looked over at me and smiled. When we got out at the station, he chucked the candy in the bin. “They never learn.”

“Maybe you need to teach them.” I shrugged and nodded toward the park. “Fish and chips? It’s my turn.”

He nodded and then looked back toward the station. “They’re just thorns without a rose in my mind. I don’t know how to tell them they don’t have a chance.”

There was nothing I could say to that. First off, his poetic nature was so incredibly sappy, it was almost adorable. Or maybe it would have been if he wasn’t so ruggedly handsome. And spineless. He could tell them off in a heartbeat if he wasn’t such a...

... no he couldn’t. If he had, my Harry... _my_ Harry would have been truly lost. I’m glad he brushed them aside. I’m glad he’s annoyed and not interested in them, and I’m also glad that he wasn’t rude and mean. 

“So, how long have you lived here, Drake?” He asked me when I brought his bundle of paper-wrapped grease back to him.

“Me? Oh, not long at all. Just about as long as... Well, when we first met, I guess.” I thought that if I could manage to blunder my way through this conversation without giving everything away, it would be a miracle. “What about you?”

“Oh, near on four years now.” He’d been there since the end of the trials. “I took a job downtown and found this flat. Yeah, we get some of the Charing Cross crowd out here, but it was convenient and affordable for once.” Funny how things work out when the entire Ministry of Magic is making sure you’re set for life. “My co-workers consider it something of a miracle that I could find such a nice place so close to work.”

“Oh, what do you do?” Now, _this_ had me really curious. What sort of a career could a former savior of the world take on?

“I’m a kindergarten teacher.”

\---ooo---

Part Four

He has seriously made me re-think everything I knew. Yesterday, he tells me he’s a kindergarten teacher. Today, when I get on the train, he comes over and sits next to me, then plunks that white wire into my ear and plays me this music that’s... I don’t even know how to describe it. It was like listening to colors, there was so much going on.

The good part about all that was that the girls didn’t bother him today. They just stood there watching the two of us listen to music together. Okay, yeah, I might have flipped them a couple of fingers, but that was beside the point. Harry’s attention was focused on me. And for the first time through this whole ordeal, I felt a little weird about it all.

I mean, nobody’s supposed to know who he is or where he is. As far as the wizarding world is concerned, he’s lost, never to be found again. But I found him. I found him sitting on a train only two stops down from Kings Cross for Merlin’s sake! That has to be some sort of karma, right? I’m not going to blow his cover to the ministry and everyone who might be after him. But at the same time, I’m not going to pretend like he’s just any other Muggle. We’ve become friends, and that’s not something I can say about many people.

Honestly, that’s not something I can say about _any_ people. I used to have cronies and followers and worshippers but after the war and everything that came with it, I ended up with...

No, this isn’t about me. This story is about what his life is like. I never went looking for him, that’s the important thing. And I found him, that’s what’s the even more important thing.

Anyway, when we got off at the station, he pointed out that I hadn’t said two words to him the whole time we were on the train. I told him that I had a lot on my mind - which was true. Then I told him that work had been hard that day - which was false. Then, when he asked me what I did for a living, I told him “nothing, really” - which was true. And then I elaborated on that and told him I worked security and sat around watching the telling all day - which was false.

And I think he knew it was false because it turns out that glowy rectangle thing isn’t _telling_ it’s a _telly_. He looked at me funny. I told him it had been a long day.

Then he asked me into his flat for a drink.

I didn’t say no. I should have said no, but I didn’t. And when I went inside and he told me to make myself at home, I knew I really, _really_ should have said no.

And when he went into his bedroom and came out about two minutes later wearing a pair of running shorts and a tight t-shirt, then went to the steel kitchen cooling cabinet and brought out two bottles of beer, opened them both, and handed me one, I knew that if anyone found out about this, I would be up before the tribunal in a heartbeat.

Then he clinked his bottle against mine, smiled at me, and sat down on his sofa. He picked up a small black rectangle, and pressed a button to make the telly start to glow, and invited me over to watch a bunch of tiny people on that screen kick around a black and white ball.

Actually, the more I think about it, the more it seemed like a much safer, Muggle form of Quidditch. I have to admit, I kind of liked it. For a moment, I thought that this kind of life might not be so bad. 

 

\---ooo---

Part Five

Damn it! Someone had better come and save me from myself before things go too far. The amount of hell that I’ve just been through rivals what I went through five years ago!

 _Phew_. I’ll start at the beginning. Or at least the beginning of this part of the story.

He wasn’t on the train - which wasn’t such a surprising thing. I mean, people do sometimes have other things to do, right? But still, not being on the train kind of threw me for a loop. So, I got off at the next station, doubled back, and realized that I had no idea which station was the one where he actually got _on_ the train. So, in all of my brilliance, I started looking for kindergartens downtown.

Do you have _any_ idea how many kindergartens there are along the downtown London Circle? There are a LOT. So, I’m standing there outside a pub, asking some bloke about how I can figure out which kindergarten has a teacher named Harry working at it, and at first he looks at me like I’ve got three heads. Then he tells me to use a nap on my phone. Just how the hell a nap is going to help me, I have no idea. And I don’t have a phone. That’s a silly Muggle thing that would have no use in my life.

Unless Harry has a phone. Then I might consider getting one so he could call me. But that’s beside the point! The man thought I was a kidnapper or something ‘cause he called someone else over who was wearing a dark blue suit - certainly looked like an auror without the robes - and that chap told me to go about my own business. I tried to explain that this _was_ my business, and that it certainly wasn’t any business of his why I would want to find this man.

The Muggle auror didn’t take that very well. He told me that maybe I ought to reconsider a few things while waiting at the station. When I told him that I was just at the station, waiting for Harry and he never showed up, things got even worse.

I suppose I was lucky, then, that he happened to show up right at that time. Well, maybe I was lucky. Harry was drunk and had apparently been drinking with some of his female co-workers. “OH! LOOK!” he shouted. Why drunken people can’t seem the grasp the fact that sober people can hear them just fine is beyond my understanding. “I told you about him! Didn’t I tell you? I told you, Marie! And here he is.”

Now, here’s the part where I think I really needed saving. Harry came right up to me, draped both arms over my shoulders and gave me this stupid smile. “He’s so beautiful, isn’t he?” He blubbered. I think one of the girls started laughing and said something to the effect of “yes, he is, now let’s get you home.”

Or maybe that was what _I_ said. I don’t remember. Either way, I put my arms around his waist and pulled him in close. “See, I don’t need a nap!” 

\---ooo---

 

Did I mention he was an idiot? Yeah, well, it’s worth mentioning again. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I think he’s adorable and sexy as hell, but he _is_ an idiot. That night, he _gave his keys_ to the lady named Maria. It’s apparently this thing some Muggles do so that people don’t use their machines while intoxicated.

But Harry doesn’t have a travel machine. He uses the worm tube!

Here’s what happened. 

Idiot.

I dragged him along with me to the tube again, and we rode out to our station. He wanted to go through the park to get fish and chips, but I told him that if he ate all that grease, he’d likely get sick all over me and then I’d drop him on the hard pavement like pixie poop. He was being childish, so _I_ was being childish. Anyway, we went along the street, and it was a good thing I was there because he almost walked right into the four-way without waiting for the picture of the green man to flash in the black box. Instead, he took this opportunity to cuddle my neck and shoulder a little more and tell me that he’d missed me so much, he had to go and have a whiskey with the girls to chase me out of his mind. I _do_ tend to have that sort of effect on people, you know.

When we finally did get to his front door, he patted his pockets and then started laughing. No, he didn’t have his key, he gave it to Maria.

Well, what could I do? I can’t just pull out a wand, cast _alohamora_ and get him into his own flat. Even drunk, he’d remember something like that. So, I brought him around to my flat - which was still disgusting and I’d invested practically nothing in it, but at least there was a bed, a sofa, and the basic necessities for living.

On our way there, he started singing a song that we’d listened to on the tube one day. I couldn’t really understand most of what he was saying, but he seemed to think it was incredibly amusing. The chorus included the words “I Love to Hate You.” I think it was at that point I suspected that bits of his memory were returning.

When we did get to my flat, he stumbled in with me, asked for the loo, and went directly there where he proceeded to sick up into my toilet. I won’t even pretend that it didn’t make me nauseous. I’m a pretty passionate person, and a rather loving one toward certain people, but I’m not the kind of man who can go into a loo when someone is losing the contents of his stomach to pat his back or help him clean himself up. No, if I had gone in there, it would not have been a pretty sight.

Instead, I prepared a warm, wet flannel for him in the kitchen, and waited for him to come out.

“Better?” I asked, handing him the flannel.

“I think so. Whiskey and beer together are better going down than coming back up.”

“Whiskey and beer together could not be considered “better” unless one was comparing it to being hit in the face with a 50-kilo boulder.” I put one hand on his shoulder and he looked over at me. 

I asked him if he was sober and he shook his head “no.” So, I made him sit on the sofa while I made some tea and gathered a few bready-things together for him to eat. Unfortunately, I only had bread. While I was toasting it, he asked me something that almost made me run away.

“Do you think we were lovers in another life?”

\---ooo---

Part Seven

I’m in this horrible cramped place between wanting him to remember everything and acknowledging who I am, and wanting a fresh start with a Harry Potter who doesn’t know a damn thing about my past. No, I’m not ashamed of not being stronger than I was when I was a kid. And yes, I wish I could take back some of my actions, but I made the best decisions I could at the time, and in the end, I think I did pretty well for someone in my circumstances. 

But all that, again, is about me, and the rest of this needs to be about him. Because I think I did something terrible again. Even though I still say I did the best I could at the time, I still stepped beyond that boundry.

I kissed him. 

Oh, God, now that I think about it, that wasn’t the entire problem. First, I led him over to the sofa and made him sit down. Then I knelt in front of him and pushed his hair off of his forehead. Of course they’d concealed the scar, but I knew where it was hiding. I knew then and I will always know every inch of his face. Now, I couldn’t really say anything, right? After all, I’m not supposed to know things like that. I’m also a horrible liar, so if I did try to tell him no, I’m sure he would have seen right through me.

Instead, I let my heart sink into my stomach, I leaned forward, and kissed him on the forehead, right where I knew that scar was buried. And I felt his magic buried in there. Oh, it was so familiar, and harkened back to a time when we were far more innocent and could have done so much better. But that beautiful feeling of Harry Potter’s magic under my lips was almost as intoxicating as the whiskey I could still smell on him.

Merlin! If I had known that they’d buried it all in his forehead, I would have held back! Wait, no, I probably wouldn’t have held back, but I wouldn’t have kissed him _there_. Come to think of it, I wouldn’t have kissed him on the lips, either. He did, after all, still smell like whiskey and vomit. And no matter how much I might be attracted to someone, I do have my limits.

How unlikely was it that I found him. And then we became friends. And then he found me, and then things just happened. I can’t emphasize this enough. It wasn’t my fault!

But maybe I mucked things up right after that. When I sat back on my heels, after feeling his magic I have to admit I was reeling, he just stared at me for a moment. Then his eyes flashed with recognition. I knew it would be bad. I knew it! There was a reason he went to them and asked for a new identity. There was a reason they granted his wish. Now, we all know that Harry Potter is the Ministry’s golden child. And that he could ask for virtually anything he wanted and they would grant him that wish. But to have your past hidden away and be given an entirely new identity was something they didn’t do every day.

Maybe every week, but not every day. And you had better have a damn good reason for asking them to do it, too. But I honestly didn’t even think about it at the time because, well, I didn’t know he would get his memories back, and even if he did, I had no idea that I might be the one who would do it.

I reckon my own magic was so powerful it triggered something in him that awoke his internal self from its slumber.

“Draco?” He gasped. “What have you done?”

What could I say? My heart and head were in a panic, and I wasn’t thinking straight. Besides, you try thinking of something clever when those bright green eyes are staring straight into your soul! So, I said the first thing that came to mind. Isn’t that the normal reaction?

“I’ve fallen in love with you.”

\---ooo---

 

Just which ancestor of mine was so exceptionally _daft_ that they decided to present me with this sorry excuse of a fate? No, I really want to know! Because if it was my Great-Great Uncle Tiberius, like I suspect, then I’ll have him know he’s getting _no_ offerings this year on remembrance day! Why did you make me find him? Why did you somehow arrange for us to meet again? Did I _look_ as if I needed this kind of grief in my life? Haven’t I already paid enough for past sins?

He left me. After his memories came back, he just said “Oh my God, I’ve got to get out of here,” and left without another word, without a glance, and without a touch. 

I’ve been riding that stupid, fucking worm-tube around in circles for days now, and he never shows up. I’ve gone to the pub where he came stumbling out drunk, and he’s never there. I’ve stood under the light at that four-way for hours, just watching. I knew his window, I knew his steps, his doorway, and I knew it was late, but I also knew he had to come home sometime.

At some point, I got tired of standing and sat down with my back against the lamppost. The moon was huge and yellow and looked like someone had punched a hole in the night sky. I think I prayed that my own memories would be erased so I wouldn’t have to think about how badly I’d fucked things up. When the moon had set and he still wasn’t home, I reckoned there was nothing more I could do. I walked over to the fish and ships truck, but it was closed down. Why in Merlin’s name did I think he would be at a fish and chips truck in the earliest hours of the morning? Nothing was making sense to me at that time. Hell, nothing makes sense now, either.

So, when I went back to the lamppost, I noticed a light on in his room. Apparently he’d made it home. Somehow I was relieved enough to laugh, then cry. Oh, fuck off! Draco Malfoy cries sometimes. Get over it!

Right, I’m done telling this story. If you want to hear more about Draco Malfoy being an idiot, you can ask anyone who went to school with me. I’m just going to keep sitting here until either he comes out, or someone hauls me away.

\---//oo\\\\---

Draco Malfoy is an idiot. Why even keeps this ridiculous journal is beyond me. Still, it’s fucking adorable, and it’s helped me understand a lot more about what’s going on.

Right now, he’s sleeping soundly on my bed while I’m trying to sort out all of the shit he’s stirred up at the Ministry by awakening my memories. Nothing is easy when it comes to him, but then, maybe that’s why I love him so.

My memories were supposed to be suppressed for a period of five years after the trials to protect both me and my loved ones. And by loved ones, I mean specifically one particular love _one_. Ron and Hermione were safe enough, as were the rest of the Weasleys. However, there was one particular pureblood, blond git who had turned Merlin’s evidence against some of his father’s “friends” who would certainly be in danger had my memories been accessible to certain politically charged factions.

And since he was far to precious to me to subject him to living a Muggle life away from his family and friends for five years, I chose to take it upon myself to do so. After all, I’d lived as a Muggle half my life, never knowing a damn thing about the wizarding world. I could easy enough do it again.

Then he found me. Bless his beautiful soul. He found me.

God, he’s in love with me, too. Can you believe it? After all these years! When I was a kid, all I could think about was him. Yeah, he was an annoying prat, but that doesn’t mean I hated him. Okay, yeah, I did hate him for a while. But you can hate someone and still love them and want them at the same time. Believe me, it’s possible.

So, he fell in love with me, and brought back my memories, and then I had to quick go to the Ministry and sort everything out before a dozen aurors and unspeakables came down upon him and hauled him off to who-knows-where.

And what does he do? He searches for me again. Damn, if I wasn’t writing this journal entry, I’d go into bed with him right now and... yeah, you know... just on that idea alone.

Fuck it! Journals are overrated. Anyway, now it’s documented. Draco, you can read through this and remember that first night I jumped you while you were sleeping and trying to recover, and this was what it was all about. 

Now, you’re sleeping far too peacefully in there, and we’re both wearing clothes which is an abomination if you ask me. I’m going to rectify both situations right now.

Oh, and I love you. That too.


End file.
